Here’s a quick comparison of the market share for US auto sales compared with participation in the Car Allowance Rebate System (aka “Cash for Clunkers”).

The distribution of rebates among top manufacturers tracks pretty closely to their recent market share. But, if you look closely, you’ll see that GM, Ford, and Chrysler are all slightly below expectations, while all the imports (except VW) are above.

Conclusion: import manufacturers got a larger share of the incentive program than their general market share would anticipate.

With President Obama’s inauguration came a new website for the White House, generating lots of buzz around the internet. Obama supporters have high hopes for his leadership, and for web geeks in particular, high hopes for his web site.

For myself, I found the executive orders section interesting and something worth keeping an eye on over time. Unfortunately, that portion of the site doesn’t have its own RSS feed. With a quick site scraper assembled with Yahoo! PIpes, I created a feed that pulls in the full content of each executive order and presidential memo:

With election time almost upon us, I wanted to do a quick survey of useful voting guides, with a focus on California’s collection of propositions. The California Official Voter Information Guide comes in at a smooth 143 pages, too much for most people to read, so guides like these become essential.

Neutral or non-partisan

Ballotpedia has a detail proposition list that includes the cost of signatures; also check out their summary of 2008 ballot measures nationwide which has some detailed summaries, including the revelation that California has the most measures on the ballot of any state this election

Project Vote Smart has a list of all measures; interestingly, they also have a public web service (in beta) that might make some interesting mashups possible

I love the take on propositions on mahna mahna blog, starting with his introduction: “It’s election season, which means the people of California once again have the chance to inflict grievous harm upon their beloved state via the initiative process.”

The Sierra Club has their list of recommendations, typically those related to the environment; surprisingly they also have a stance on Prop 4 (parental notification for abortion) — it seems odd to me that the Sierra Club would have a position on family planning and abortion